hyrax

Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

n. Any of several herbivorous mammals of the family Procaviidae within the order Hyraoidea of Africa and adjacent Asia, resembling woodchucks or similar rodents but more closely related to the hoofed mammals. Also called coney1, dassie.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

n. any of several small, ungulate herbivorous mammals, of the order Hyracoidea, with a bulky frame and fang-like incisors; they are native to Africa and the Middle East.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English

n. Any animal of the genus Hyrax, of which about four species are known. They constitute the order Hyracoidea. The best known species are the daman (Hyrax Syriacus) of Palestine, and the klipdas (Hyrax capensis) of South Africa. Other species are Hyrax arboreus and Hyrax Sylvestris, the former from Southern, and the latter from Western, Africa. See Daman.

from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

n. The typical genus of the family Hyracidæ and order Hyracoidea, having the molar teeth like those of a rhinoceros in pattern, the lower incisors only slightly notched, the upper incisors approximated, and the upper lip cleft.

There is something inexplicable about East Africa: its endless skies dotted with puffs of clouds that seem within arms reach, the smell of dry brush on the savannah, the billowing dust on rutted dirt roads; the screams of a hyrax, the way the sun, cartoon-like, suddenly pops up at dawn and as quickly drops down at the same time every evening.

Mr. Laudamiel used 25 ingredients to create the scent, including amyl acetate, which smells like pear and banana, synthetic civet, which smells vaguely fecal, and hyraceum absolute, an extract made from the excrement of the rock hyrax, a small African mammal.